


Within an Epsilon

by Naome



Category: Final Fantasy XIV
Genre: Reader-Insert, Sad, i think, very sad
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-08-29
Updated: 2015-08-29
Packaged: 2018-04-17 19:38:32
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,034
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4678844
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Naome/pseuds/Naome
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"Closer, I felt, closer our souls seemed to get to each other. We were always within an epsilon of each other’s souls, and we were so close that if we reached out, maybe we could have touched each other’s very core and felt our warmth towards each other. Yet, even though I would reach out, I could never quite get to him."</p>
            </blockquote>





	Within an Epsilon

**Author's Note:**

> This is probably a very good summary of how I felt about the WoL's and Haurchefant's relationship in the end. Feel free to insert your very own WoL (if you want to cry).

                Bards have often performed songs of fated meetings, orchestrated so carefully yet subtly by the stars hovering above us. A glance brought about by chance, a soft brush of the hands when walking past each other, an aura which invited the other party to begin a conversation. Eyes that held a mysterious meaning looking into yours, yet you would know why the other person looked at you like that. _Only_ you would know that mysterious meaning behind that long look they would give you.

                Yet, bards also tell their share of star-crossed togethers, ones which did form and break, and others which should have formed but never did. In some tales, the hands of the lovers intertwined their fingers only for death or jealousy to rip them apart. In others, the hands of lovers reached out for the other but could not reach them despite countless attempts.

                As I shifted my legs to cross them on the hard snow, I looked at the memorial before me with bleary eyes. It had been awhile since I began to sit here, staring at the name etched beautifully onto the stone before me. Tingling sensations shot up through my leg, only for any feeling to be numbed a few seconds later. The chill held no touch against my skin as I took slow, deep breaths.

                It had been a long time since he died. It had been a long time since they created this small memorial for Haurchefant. Yet, the small gravestone erected in his name on this cliff at Providence Point held an immense meaning: his love and loyalty towards Ishgard, even when the forces of winter or harsh nobility sought to cut his body and spirit. From his birth as an illegitimate child, he had always been fighting the world.

                Little people saw that, and even little more stood by his side and cheered for him as he sought to overturn the circumstances which were designed to keep him lower than others. There were times where he would simply run away, his feet carrying him far away and so fast that the shadows on the ground could not grab his ankles and drag him into the darkness. Then, he eventually learned to fight back, to know the meaning for fighting for what one believed in and for what one loved.

                Without thinking, I reached for his broken shield and embraced it, letting the steel’s cold touch shock the nerves on my arms and hands. I laid my head on it and hummed a small melody to myself. I rocked back and forth with the rhythm of my small song, closing my eyes as I let nostalgia take over my senses.

                Slowly, I felt less and less of the cold grip of winter onto my shoulders and face, and I began to feel more and more of a gentle warmth from a memory long ago. We were sitting together, outside of Camp Dragonhead, enjoying a small lunch with one another’s company. I was laughing loudly at his joke before telling a story of mine, and he was patting my shoulder to help me calm down. I told him of a time when Papalymo was pranked by Yda, and how red he turned when he found out. It was his turn to laugh at this story.

                Closer, I felt, closer our souls seemed to get to each other. We were always within an epsilon of each other’s souls, and we were so close that if we reached out, maybe we could have touched each other’s very core and felt our warmth towards each other. Yet, even though I would reach out, I could never quite get to him. Even though we would laugh together only to calm down a few seconds later, sighs followed. We talked of friendship, then of love, then of marriage and bliss from a pact of eternal devotion.

                Yet, even though my stomach would flutter and he would smile so gently with a light twinkle in his eyes, we would sigh in the end. Friendship, that we had. Love, almost. Marriage?

                Maybe never. It seemed nigh impossible, with how I had to stay devoted to preserving the realm and with how he was shackled by his status as nobility. Perhaps our paths were never meant to cross, like parallel lines in the same plane, but by the off chance, they did and now we had to suffer slowly for it.

                And now that maybe is a truth. And that truth was our punishment. A truth that weighs so heavily on my heart that it could sink me to the very bottom of the ocean until the end of time. I opened my eyes, my vision blurred with fresh tears. I sighed. I swore I could smell a bit of his scent on the shield, yet this thought would only serve to break my heart even more.

                The tears I had shed surely froze on the shield he used to protect me. When he was on the verge of dying, I finally found the strength to reach out to his soul and to touch it. Of course, it did not last long.

                I like to think he did the same by telling me to smile. I was so close, and maybe he was too, to saying _something_ that would have ended with marriage. That should have ended with a pact of eternal devotion. Of eternal love.

                I let go of the shield, letting it drop with a dull thud onto the snow beneath me. Slowly, on my knees and hands, I crawled closer to his memorial. For just a bit, ever since that day, I could feel like I was so close to his soul again by staring at this stone. Yet, grief and guilt tugged at my heart so ceaselessly that I would feel ill and begin to cry. My shoulders shook, and I would shake my head as I stuffed my face into my snow-covered hands. A chill ran through my arms and my legs as I cried. Everything felt cold. The world felt cold.

                I was so close. We were so close. He was so close. To me. I to him.

**Author's Note:**

> The title is honestly (and not surprisingly considering I love math) inspired by the delta-epsilon definition of the limit, usually introduced in the first calculus class. It's also something I should review for my current calculus class. I started school this Wednesday so I'll be busy for awhile haha. I still intend to finish "The Lips That Did Part" though when time permits.


End file.
